puff of frosty air with him, from the piazza where he had been stalking, he went and leaned over her chair, watching the bright flower she wrought; as she glanced up she saw there was a strange light on his face, his lips were parted, his face fevered. 66 Are you ill, again?" she exclaimed. But he shook his head and walked away. Presently she looked up once more. "I am not good company for you, am I?" she said. "I did not think till lately that it must be dull for you. Would you like to have me sing to you?" And she went to the piano, and sang. He followed, and turned the leaves for her; now and then he joined in, but only now and then, as if his voice were not quite under his control, as if it were unequal to the weight of some emotion. When she rose, she held the edge of the piano, as if it were all she could do, as she said: "Do you knowI am going to make a confession " "It is I that should make confession! he cried warmly. "Oh no, indeed, sne said in that calm silver treble. "You have done so much to make me contented here, and I have been so ungracious! I-that is-if-if we cannot be more, we can at least be friends?" and she held her hand winningly towards him, in amazement to see him wheel about and march out of the room. And she heard him treading the crisp snow outside, followed by his dogs. The letters, and the emotions they aroused, had been having a softening effect on Emilia; she had discerned a glimmer of her culpability in rendering Ordronnaux' home offensive to him; she had made her effort, and the repulse mortified and confounded her. She stood a moment, silent and wondering and affronted, and then she went to her own room and took refuge with her unknown friend and her letters; and she had the field to herself, for Ordronnaux was away again at daybreak. Emilia began to live simply from letter to letter, to reckon her time by them; the delay of one depressed and its hastening elated her. Presently she was modelling her thoughts and ways after the ideas and wishes that she gathered thus, looking at the universe through another's eyes; and, all the time, she was doing her utmost to be worthy of this friendship-a friendship of high philosophy, she would have told you, since not a word had yet occurred in all these letters to put her on her guard. If a letter lingered now, she fancied her friend were ill, and she was in a flutter of apprehension till she heard; when, as many times, a heavy snow blocked the trains and no mails came, she walked the house like an unquiet ghost, realizing what it would be to her if those letters never came again, warm and flushed with an access of gratitude that they had come so long, trembling directly lest the mind she so valued should one day outgrow her and have no more to say to her at all. Poor Ordronnaux' telegrams, that from time to time were forwarded from the station, she hardly glanced at thoroughly. One March morning there came a letter which she opened with her usual haste, and her face fell to see that, instead of the long pages of delight, there were but four lines-he was to be in that portion of the country and would delay over a train, and be that day in the light wood where he, unseen, had seen her walk, if she cared to meet him. If she cared to meet him! Now she might have known how she had cared by the eager way in which the blood surged up and crimsoned all her face, by the shaking of her hands as she dressed herself hastily, without a thought of her appearance, thinking only of what she was to see, and hurrying impetuously along, for it was ten o'clock, and at ten he had said he would be there. She entered the wood where, every day, she walked, and through which there was always a trodden path. The naked boughs let in the sunshine, and here and there the crust had thawed from the mossy stones. The red hips of the wild rose, the skeleton seed-vessels of the gerardia, the brown leaves still clinging to a young oak, the swelling buds on the trees, all gave the place a sort of stir and life, even in that nipping air. Through openings of the lichened stems, looking down over the low country, she could see the dazzle of the sunshine, and the blue melting to a soft wide blush along the far horizon and giving a pale flamelike aureole to all the pointed pines. Once in a while a branch caught her and detained her, a black crow rose flappingly and startled her, a dark green hemlock shivered in the wind and shook down its silver weight about her. She thought nothing could be more beautiful than this walk through the yet winter wood to meet the person on whom it seemed to her now her whole world swung. She had not stopped to fasten the white fur cloak, with its black fox edgings and blue linings that she wore, her chestnut hair, gilded in the sunshine, was blown from under her hood, her cheeks were damask in the fresh wind, her eyes were glowing, her mouth was dimpled with its eager smile; she heard a footstep and half paused, her heart in her throat. Now she should see him, the one who had given a value to life, the hero whose dimly seen, dimly remembered face she had never been able to recall-and Ordronnaux came round the curve of the path, walking from the station with his knapsack on his shoulder. "Have you come to meet me?" he cried, extending his hand. know I had come? I did not telegraph, purposely I thought I should surprise you." He had surprised her. And of course there was nothing to do but to turn about, half stupefied, with Ordronnaux, and walk quietly back again, gathering one dead thing and another as she choked back childish tears of disappointment. Once in her own room again, she let those tears come in a flood. A salt and bitter flood. But out of no bitterer or salter flood was it that once before Love rose ! For, as the drops were still falling through Emilia's fingers she snatched her hands from her face and looked about her in a sudden horror, a scorching blush tingled over her like a wave of hot air, from head to foot, her tears seemed to turn to fire, she bounded to her feet and wrung her hands, and went and hid her face, and wished that she had never been born. In one moment she had seen the precipice upon which she stood. On which she stood? Say rather the height from which she had fallen, from which she had fallen here among all corrupt things! 739 should that have hindered him? No, she was served as she deserved. The sharpest pang of all was that-as she deserved! She dared not hope for another letter; she was self-convicted of crime in the wish for one; she felt that she had become a thing unfit ever to enter again into communication with the mind that seemed to her like some far white spirit. Blame for him, in the casuistry of her love, she did not dream. of; he was a friend simply and entirely; it was she, a wife, on whom all the blame must rest-how could, how could she have drifted here, how could she have so far forgotten herself as to write in the begin"How did youning! Her own self-reproach was too vivid to let her dwell on his share, or in her simplicity to remember that he was a man, in the current of the world, who knew what he was about. And yet she longed for a single word; she shivered one instant at the possibility that, after all, he might not know, might never know, and she despaired the next-she knew! If she had not lost already, loss, inevitable loss, only to be bridged by death, was before her, she saw. But she had not reached the point of any serious thought, everything with her yet was in the ferment of emotion. Her nerves were all alive; she started at every sound; she cringed at Ordronnaux' most quiet words; she knew what he had suffered now, and she paused, even in the midst of her pain, wishing she could make some reparation. When, in the game of chess that he one night proposed, he took her ice-cold hand in his, to move her pawn and she felt the heat and the pulse and the tremor there, she burst into tears. But Ordronnaux seemed to take no notice of these moods-why should he, after all that had gone before? She dragged herself through the day, and dressed and descended to dinner, daring to do nothing else; and though Ordronnaux had much to talk of that was pleasant, for he had been at Harriman's wedding, to excuse herself from which she had used the pretext of a cold,-yet never was there so long or so cruel an evening as that, before she could hide herself in darkness. In the week that followed now, Emilia endured anguish. Forsaken, she felt, disgraced. Because aware of them herself at last, she made sure that her sensations were recognized and known by their object also that was the reason he neither came nor made explanation, not because Ordronnaux was on the train, for why At length, as Emilia sat, heavy-eyed and pale at the breakfast-table, hoping for nothing any more, the letters being brought in, it happened that Ordronnaux handed Emilia hers. He would have been blind not to see the wild light that suddenly ran like summer lightning through her eyes. She sat on thorns, hearing him read from one of his letters that Harriman would be there that day with Alice and Louise, and that Colonel Greve would join them by a later train; trying vainly to drink her coffee; conscious of Ordronnaux' frequent gaze until his departure warranted her own, and she could tear open her let ter. It was not the letter that Emilia had ex pected or hoped for. As she read it, alone in her room, her heart leaped up and almost stifled her with its swift beatings. In the first moment she clasped it to her breast with ecstasy, in the next she had whirled it from her to the floor. But she ran and seized it again, kissed it passionately, and hurried up and down the room with it as a caged creature does, or as one might go whose feet were winged with joy. 66 "You see of course it was impossible to go," he said. And perhaps it was as well. For, let me say it,—if I had seen you come smiling towards me, your soul in your face, all eager and glad to meet me, I could not have done anything but take you to my heart! Yes, I have written it! Now you know-what yet you must have known before. I love you! I love you! I love you! Does this seem recreant? To have seen your beautiful spirit unfolding like a flower in these months, and have done otherwise, had been recreant indeed! When I think-as I do think!-that you also, you—No, it is not for me to speak. I ask nothing. Never to my gaze may the eye brighten or the cheek redden, never may I feel the dear hair touch my faceyet with a word, a word, you can lead me out of darkness into light. But say it or not, it shall be enough for me to know that I love you and 'In the midmost heart of grief My passion clasps a secret joy!'" It would have been out of the question for Emilia to go down stairs again that day, but for the fact that Captain Harriman and his party were coming and she must brace herself to the exertion. And in the meantime what was she to do? Answer the letter-she could not. But as she lay on the lounge, that first fervor of her passion spent, a lock of her loosened hair fell across her neck; she rose quickly and took the scissors and severed it, and wrapping the bright and fragrant tress in an envelope, without so much as a single pencilling inside, she directed it with the usual address, and rang the bell and ordered it to be sent with the other letters to the post -nor did she know that Ordronnaux himself took the letters to the post that day on the way to meet his guests. But what lover could have desired a dearer answer, could have had a tenderer? She was in her wrapper still when they came, and her heart warm now to all the world, she ran flying down the stairs to receive them, though the wealth of that unbraided hair was still streaming about her, radiant with the happiness she had not yet begun to sift or search, into which realization of sin or sorrow or separation had not come, the rose burning on her cheek, the smiles hanging on her lips; and Ordronnaux, having directed Harriman, who had been there before and knew the house, to his quarters, attended them to the sitting-room, where, sooth to say, he had not been before since he first brought Emilia home. There was a peculiar excitement about Ordronnaux that day— you could not tell whether it was the unquiet of joy or trouble; but Emilia had no eyes to see it. Alice and Louise flitted about the room, looking at this thing and that; Ordronnaux standing by the fireplace and once in a while stealing a look at Emilia where she sat, the moment that any one ceased talking to her, wrapped again in her rosy dream. And presently the dressing-bell rang. "This will never do," said Ordronnaux. "Will you show Mrs. Harriman her room, Emilia-the oriel? I sent Harriman there. And Louise, you said, you would put in the south gable. I suppose Colonel Greve will be along directly, but John will take care of him.' "He was to come in the express," said Louise, "and bribe the conductor to let him off at your station." "I shall be glad to meet him at last; he is an elusive fellow, a sort of Myth of a Man who did Supernatural things with a battery." "Prodigies!" said Alice. "That opens a new field," exclaimed Ordronnaux. "The blood-red blossom of war with a heart of fire.' stinging blush that seemed to burn and brand itself upon her. In the presence of this pure and faithful young wife she could not say a word, for she remembered the thing she had just done. does not promote conversational talent. But now, as if some hidden sting urged him, jest and epigram sparkled from his lips, and even Emilia was obliged to listen and to question what ailed him, and to remember by and by "That frail blaze of excellence that neighbors death," as, restlessly brilliant, with an artificial gayety, perhaps, that hid a trouble behind its coruscation, he kept Colonel Greve engaged so constantly that there was no possibility of his addressing an undertone to his hostess, had he desired it, until the evening ended-as it did very early, on account of the long journey to that place. on the winter hills. As Emilia sat on the hassock in her sitting-room, a few moments after the separation down stairs, cowering over the fallen ashes, white and cold, and totally bewildered, unable to comprehend or reconcile the events of the day, clasping her hands on her forehead with a sense that she must be Perhaps it did not need the violet velvet that she wore to heighten the color of her cheek, when Emilia had descended to dinner, and make Ordronnaux feel a thrill coursing through him at the spectacle of her loveliness, as she stood talking with Harriman while they waited for Colonel Greve. Was it the too abundant light, was it the heat that suddenly brought a deathly pallor to blanch Emilia's face? She grasped the back of the chair beside her, her heart was giving such throbs that it seemed all the room could hear them, she glanced at Ordronnaux in a terror to see him start and tremble and turn as white himself. For fate had found him out. The gentleman who, as the servant announced Col. Greve, left his crutch and came forward to be presented to his host and hostess, was no other than the hero of the white rose. Emilia bent before him, as cold and pal-going distracted, Ordronnaux rapped upon lid that moment as a corpse. But Ordronnaux had recovered himself and was beside her, taking the Colonel's hand and welcoming him with pleasant cordiality. Then the new-comer passed to Louise. "I declare," he said under his breath, "your friend, the hostess, is the most wonderful piece of mechanism I ever saw! Is it wax or marble? You don't pretend to call it flesh and blood? Does she ever speak? It is Inez de Castro over again! Now I will tell you a secret," he said, taking her fan. "That is the rival I have held over your head! But I should hardly have known her. How did I ever dare to give her a flower! You see she has not forgiven the liberty!" And then the butler had entered and the wonderful piece of mechanism had taken his arm and they were at the table. As Emilia raised her eyes to him a moment, she saw that he wore upon the lapel of his coat a little Scotch white rose. Ordronnaux saw it too, and he was grinding his teeth at the strange coincidences of chance while he sent the Colonel his sherry. But if Emilia had been able to utter any words during the dinner, beyond those of simplest civility, she had no opportunity; for never had she heard or seen Ordronnaux precisely as then-it was true that circumstances never allowed it before, for gracious coolness on the part of a vis-à-vis the door leading from his own rooms, and, without waiting for permission, came in. He went to the long window, and lingered there a moment, listening to the great wind that swept by, and looking out silently at the picture there-the light of the unseen moon flooding all the hollow of the sapphire sky, where the snow-clad mountain peak hung like a giant crystal glittering in many colors on the dark. Then he came and threw some logs upon the fire, for though it had melted that April day in the sun, it was still winter among those hills. As the odorous black birch began to snap and send up its jets of flame, she looked up and saw him leaning an arm upon the mantel-shelf, and gazing down at her. "Emilia, my dear wife," said he then, gently, can you listen to something I have to say to you?" She could not speak; she made a motion with her hand. "Do you remember," he said, "that once I swore to you to make you happy? Well-in what I have to say I want still to give you the least pain, the greatest happiness I may. I think it was early last Fall that you received a letter, without signature, from a person who, by an équivoque, implied that he had given you a white rose?" She looked up heavily, as he went on, not so much astonished, perhaps, as stunned. "You did not reply to the letter," he said; "though in response to the next one, you wore at your throat the flower you were asked to wear; and you answered the third by an attempt to end the matter." "Yes," she said, slowly. "But others followed. You were persuaded that you had a right to exchange letters with a friend. You thought of no imprudence. Soon you enjoyed the let ters." "Yes, she said, again. 66 As your friend sketched out his plans, and hopes, and thoughts, you also confided in him. There was nothing to hide from one who knew already of your married unhappiness. You told him all the delicate imaginings and desires that had been concealed from me, at least-that-per- | haps he kindled?" "Yes!" she said again. "As you so hesitatingly, and then so freely, revealed to him the reserves of your nature, that friend became your lover. He appointed a day to meet you. With disappointment you met only me." "Yes," she said. "Do not think," she said, stolidly, with her dry lips," that I should not in time have told you all this." "And do not think that I should have troubled you about it. I do not know," said Ordronnaux, leaving her and walking up and down after his habit, "I cannot say how it would have ended; but for the accident to-night of this man and his accursed white rose, this man whom I recognized and whom you did, as the one who dropped his flower on your book." He came back and stood before her again. "Once you playfully declared that you had a confession to make," said he, "and I answered that it was I who should make confession. Are you listening? Emilia, it was I that wrote you the letters." She lifted her head, and stared at him a moment. "It is impossible," she said. 66 "No," said Ordronnaux, advancing a step, with a flush on his dark face. It is not impossible; it is true. When I recovered from the illness in which what I had endured all summer ended, I felt that my love for you had burned out, and that if I kept the ashes warm with a pleasant 66 "Pray, hear the whole," cried Ordronnaux, and he took her hands and gently placed her in the great arm-chair that he wheeled where the flicker of the firelight fell on her with all the wild beauty of that changing spot on her cheek, that fixed luster in her eye, that quiver on her lip. "I will tell you the truth," he said. "I was sorry when you came to the greenhouse and took that white rose from me.' He paused a moment, taking up one thing and another from the shelf and putting it down again, as he leaned over the blaze, and did not look at her. "And then I was reckless," he continued. "I said I would see it through; I would see what you were made of; it could do me no harm. Perhaps I thought-" he faltered; "yes, perhaps I was so base," he said, slowly, as to think that if the bond that had loosened grew irksome, here would be the means of destroying it in my own hand. Yet that was but momentary, a momentary madness. When your first letter came,that little, heart-broken letter, it touched me. I had the world before me; you had nothing. I said to myself I would lighten your days a little, if any human interest could do it; and so I wrote. And thenyou know the rest," said Ordronnaux. As week by week those letters unfolded all your spirit, and I had the very bloom of your being there, the love that had died for your fair face, your lips, your smile, was born again for the sweet soul that I was discovering. This morning, this very morning, I handed you the letter which contained the avowal of that love. This morning I had your reply." And he drew from his breast the long lock of bright brown hair, and pressed it to his lips. Emilia reached forward, and snatched it from his hand and threw it on the fire. The flame caught it. |